This invention relates to awnings and, more particularly, to retractable automatic awning assemblies for attachment to recreational vehicles and other vehicles.
Heretofore, awnings mounted on a roller bar and attached to the sides of recreational vehicles, mobile homes, campers and other vehicles, have been extended outwardly and held in place by a pair of support arms attachable at one end to the roller bar with the other end mounted on the sides of the recreational vehicle. Typically, the support arms had been held outwardly by brace or rafter arms which have been held in place by manual locking devices. In most cases, these awnings are raised and lowered manually and no means have been provided for automatically extending and automatically retracting the entire awning apparatus.
Attempts have been made to build automatic retracting and extending features into recreational vehicle awnings, but as of the date of this application, there are no commercially available devices having these features, although U.S. Pat. No. 4,160,458 issued Jul. 10, 1979 to Marcellus and U.S. Pat. No. 4,733,683 issued Mar. 29, 1988 to Pozzi relate to the general subject matter of the invention. Moreover, the assignee of the Pozzi patent, that is Fiamma S.p.A. has advertised an electrically operated awning similar to the awning disclosed in FIG. 8A of the '683 patent. However, to the knowledge of the undersigned, there is no commercially available awning for a vehicle which combines both pneumatic and electrical means for operating the awning and which carry the roller mechanism in a roller bar as is traditionally shown in commercial awnings of the type illustrated by for instance, the Duda U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,324,869, 4,576,192 and 4,634,172 or the Marcellus '683 patent which also shows awnings of this particular type.